Tomorrow is July 4th - our Independence Day. It's a time for gathering together for picnics and celebrating our wonderful country. It's a time for flying the U.S. flag and showing your pride in the good ole' USA. It doesn't seem like many have anything good to say about our country anymore. Looking through Facebook and seeing all of the negative things being said on a daily basis is saddening. I grew up in the United States Air Force. I am very patriotic. And I was taught from a young age that you NEVER bad-mouth our country in public. I'm pretty sure I would have gotten my butt beat for saying negative things about our president and our country.
My father fought for this country. He served over 20 years in the military making sure we were safe. I guess it's the reason I am so patriotic. I have a great amount of pride for those serving both here and overseas. I follow several of our daughter's friends while they serve (or their husbands serve) our country. I watch on the television and online the videos of servicemen and women coming home and the welcoming home parties. And I get tears. For two reasons .... I am proud of the way they are welcomed home and it tears me up every time. I also get tears because my dad wasn't treated that way when he came home. He fought in Vietnam, people didn't give those guys big receptions when they returned home. It saddens me because my dad was only doing what he was ordered to do, he deserved every bit the welcome that troops today received.
What really saddens me though is the way our citizens bash our government, our people, just about everything. And why, you ask would this sadden me? Because these people do it on social media alot of the time. Every other country in the world can see through social media just how fractured our country is. I'm pretty sure if people in some of the other countries out there bashed their country, leaders and government the way folks here do, they'd be be-headed or asked to leave the country. But, not here. Bullying is the norm in America anymore.
Don't get me wrong. I'm not all together thrilled with the way our country is run. Haven't been for several administrations. And I'm pretty sure that any post I put on FB, Twitter or any other page wouldn't help one bit in fixing things. So, I'll continue to try and consider what is good everyday in my life and not what is bad.
Between Dave and I, we are trying to operate two small businesses. Both of them struggle every month and have only gotten worse in the past few years. We consider closing them, but what are our options? We could move to the city, both get jobs with regular paychecks and be home each evening with the worries of trying to make enough to make our bills. Or we can continue to work 7 days a week, 14 hours or more each day and have the worries of trying to make enough to make our bills. The difference is the quality of our life. We wouldn't be happy in the city. We've tried that and hated it.
So, we'll continue to promote this great area we live in, we'll continue to beg people to advertise, we'll continue to invite people to our farm in the hopes they'll drop a quarter or two in our donation box and we'll re-evaluate things in a couple of months. Because we love what we're doing. And when things get bad enough to over-ride that, we'll change things up then. And until then, we'll at least have good veggies to eat and a beautiful deck to sit on each evening.
Have an absolutely fabulous Independence Day - and maybe think about everything that is good in your life as you celebrate the 4th, instead of all the negativity that exists in our country. God Bless the U.S.A.
Many Blessings ..... Pam
